Know Before You Go: Visiting Vienna in Winter

With its Baroque palaces and parks dusted with snow and shop fronts glittering with Christmas lights, the festive season is a magical time to visit Vienna. Celebrate the holidays by exploring the lively Christmas markets, where you can warm your hands on a steaming cup of glühwein, while browsing for gifts against the fairytale backdrops of Maria Theresien-Platz or Rathausplatz.

As the days get colder, Vienna’s legendary coffeehouses make a great spot for escaping the cold and there are endless choices dotted around the streets and squares of the Ringstrasse. Try the renowned Café Central, favored haunt of Leon Trotsky or Café Mozart, where Graham Greene preferred to get his caffeine fix. Or why not dine in style with a dinner date at the lavish Schonbrunn Palace or a Christmas Eve banquet at the magnificent Weikersdorf Castle?

Winter is also an atmospheric time to take in Vienna’s top attractions, so soak up the Old World romance with a horse-drawn carriage ride around the city or a trip to the gigantic open-air ice rink in front of Vienna City Hall. Entertainment shifts indoors over the holiday season, so get glammed up for an opera or ballet performance at the State Opera, the Musikverein or the Konzerthaus, or book tickets for a winter evening performance of the legendary Spanish Riding School. This is also the time to discover the birthplace of the waltz by joining Europe’s socialites at one of the many winter balls. Held at glamorous locations like the Hofburg Imperial Palace and the State Opera, the formal dances include famous events like the Le Grand Ball on New Year’s Eve and the Rudolfina Redoute masked ball.